NearVerse Secures $1 Million in Seed Funding To Speed Traffic on the Mobile Web Highway via “Data Carpooling”

Philadelphia, PA (April 1, 2010) – Today, mobile networking company NearVerse is announcing that they secured $1 million in seed funding from Meakem Becker Venture Capital in Q4 2009. NearVerse has been using the funding to further develop its software-based networking platform to accelerate mobile Internet beyond the capabilities of existing 3G or 4G carrier networks.

Founded in 2009, NearVerse‘s proprietary networking platform optimizes the mobile Internet experience through a proximity-powered system, improving media delivery speeds by 5-10X. NearVerse’s network architecture also leads to greater spectral efficiency and helps substantially reduce the load on existing carrier networks.

NearVerse launched their first app, LoKast for iPhone and iPod touch, at SXSW. LoKast offers users the ability to discover and share rich media content with other, proximate users, all powered by NearVerse’s networking platform. Using LoKast, users add music, photos, videos, contacts and web links to their personal ”LoKasts”, and then automatically discover other users within 300 feet and share media with them in real-time. LoKast minimizes reliance on 3G connectivity by using NearVerse’s optimized networking platform. The app is available for download at http://tinyurl.com/lokast.

Mobile networks are bogged down by an explosion of video consumption, a multitude of wireless-enabled devices (iPad, Kindles, etc) and consumer demand for a real-time and dynamic mobile Internet experience akin to that of PCs. Mobile data traffic has ballooned since the launch of the iPhone, with AT&T’s traffic increasing by over 6,000%. Verizon Wireless has also faced significant spikes of over 300% since launching the Droid smartphone offering. Carrier networks are facing enormous challenges with this surge of rich media traffic and will require out-of-the-box network architectures and content delivery approaches to stay abreast of the mobile Internet revolution.

“We believe that there is a great opportunity to build on the prior pioneering efforts of companies such as Google, Amazon, Skype, and Akamai in optimizing the wireline Internet, to solve the biggest issues facing the mobile Internet today,” states NearVerse’s CEO Boris Bogatin. “By unifying carrier and short-range wireless networks into a holistic, optimized system, NearVerse is well positioned lead this new wave of mobile Internet evolution.”

NearVerse’s funding will be used to further develop and proliferate its networking technology. This sort of a “data carpooling” approach is one of the most exciting solutions to carrier bandwidth issues, and what has interested venture capitalists Meakem Becker to invest in NearVerse.

Joining the company’s board are Glen Meakem and Alan Veeck of Meakem Becker Venture Capital.

“The Nearverse management team and technology platform has the potential to enable truly innovative content and application offers that otherwise would fail the consumer tests of speed and useability. We believe their offer is going to be extremely attractive to a large variety of mobile industry players ranging from app developers and the music industry to carriers and OEMs,” says Glen Meakem of Meakem Becker.

The company is already in major discussions with the world’s top content and app providers and carriers, working in unison to enhance the quality of their networks and applications and to enable proximity-based capabilities.

The start-up is also looking to grow its team as they are aggressively hiring talented engineers to develop its technology and service offering. Interested individuals can apply for positions on the NearVerse site.

About NearVerse

The Company is the brainchild of Boris Bogatin, a telecom executive who spent the better part of the last decade at MSV andSkyterra, developing a nationwide 4G wireless operation with leading telecom, media, and television companies. Boris was previously with Cidera, a streaming media CDN which aimed to significantly improve the speeds and quality of rich media Internet experiences. By combining his expertise in developing highly spectrum-efficient technologies and disruptive means to optimize network architectures, Bogatin developed NearVerse to accelerate the mobile Internet. NearVerse co-founder, Vic Singh, comes from RRE Ventures after making several investments in the mobile space and closely following the emergence of the smartphone era and the rise of the mobile Internet.

About Meakem Becker Venture Capital

Meakem Becker follows a disciplined investment strategy to make early-stage venture investments. We invest in great people with compelling products or services that target large markets. We use our deep experience as well as networks of former employees, customers, service providers, advisors, and investors to help entrepreneurs build and scale their businesses, creating tomorrow’s market leaders.

Contact Information

Angela Morris

Account Manager

VSC Consulting for NearVerse

Contact via E-mail